Sunday, December 27, 2009

In Memory of Gaza. . .

the victims of the massacare that began there one year ago today, those who continue to suffer under the siege, and the heroic people, Israelis, Palestinians, and internationals, who continue to risk their lives in the pursuit of justice. Viva Palestina!

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Legal Absurdities

It might not reach the level of absurdity seen earlier this year when the Israeli navy impounded a humanitarian vessel in international waters, forced its crew into Israel against their will, and then charged them with illegally entering the country, but the indictment of Abdallah Abu Rahma in a military court for weapons possession last Tuesday is up there. Rahma, a teacher by profession, is a leader in the West Bank town of Bil'in's Popular Committee, an organization that stages non-violent demonstrations with international and Israeli peace activists to protest the construction of the wall dividing the village from its land. The charges against Rahma stem from an exhibit he constructed showcasing used tear gas canisters the Israeli military had fired at unarmed demonstrators, such as American Tristan Anderson who remain in a coma after being hit by such a canister earlier this year. The military was forced to drop charges against an associate of Rahma after it was proven the man was travelling abroad when he was alleged to have attacked Israeli soldiers. This case illustrates, better than any other, that Israel's military operations in Palestine are aimed at expansion and not security. Why else would they detain non-violent activists?

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

al-Hurra and Propaganda

Most Americans have never heard of Al-Hurra, for good reason. The Arabic language station, based in northern Virginia and funded by the U.S with a $100 million yearly budget, is legally barred from broadcasting in the U.S by the Smith-Mundt Actwhich stipulates government funded propaganda cannot target domestic audiences. Of course not many people outside the U.S watch the station either. A poll by Zogby International indicated the station's audience share fell from 2% in 2008 to .5% in 2009. Spokespeople for the agency overseeing al-Hurra, the Broadcasting Board of Governors prefer to focus on how many people could watch the station, if they wanted to. "Alhurra now reaches 26.7 million people weekly across the Middle East, up almost one million in the last year," declared Letitia King, a spokeswoman for the group "these are solid numbers by any measure. Fran Mires, host of the al-Youma news show, boasts of filling a niche in the Arab market: showing from both Beirut and Jerusalem on the screen on the same time. “That’s what our competitors don’t do,” she says. Yasser Thabet, a former editor for the station offers a different image. "If some problem happened on the air," he said "people would just joke with each other, saying, 'Well, nobody watches us anyway."

Given the number of problems, that is perhaps a blessing for its producers. Along with interviews with U.S favorites and officials the station has featured favorable coverage of a Holocaust denial conference. In 2004, when other Arabic stations interrupted their programming to cover the assassination of the spiritual leader of Hamas al-Hurra broadcast a cooking show. The official tasked with managing the station can't even understand Arabic. The news director has no background in journalism. The station has taken to adding Arabic subtitles to English language shows and has purchased programming from BBC Arabic in attempt to boost ratings, which have now declined to less than the margin of error in viewership surveys.

Photo: Incompetence has so thoroughly characterized recent U.S government policy in the Middle East that it has failed even in the information war. Its al-Hurra propaganda network broadcast an uninterrupted hour long speech by Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Past the incompetence of this operation, though, lies an important issue: why is the U.S government funding propaganda broadcasts to the Arab world. It isn't a novel policy. Radio Free Europe and Radio Free Asia have been in operation for decades. The Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq spent $100 million to commander the infrastructure of Saddam's media network and establish the Iraqi Media Network, which unlike the bungled al-Hurra network is regularly viewed by about 40% of Iraqis. In the early days of his Presidency George W. Bush realized the U.S had an image problem in the Middle East. The policies that created this problem were non-negotiable, so the focus necessarily shifted towards spinning them in a positive direction.

American officials hoped what they dubbed Bush's answer to al-Jazeera, the most expensive propaganda project since the launch of Radio Free Europe in 1942, could sway Arab public opinion and mitigate the impact of coverage by al-Jazeera, whose Doha headquarters President Bush reputedly considered bombing during the siege of Fallujah. That seriously misinterprets the U.S's unpopularity in the Middle East. Americans are easy to propagandize. In the U.S, the media market is saturated, indeed dominated, by outlets subservient to U.S interests. That is not the case in the Arab world. Juxtaposed against the images of a more ruthless American power being exercised visible on mainstream networks, commentaries by American spokespeople only serve to add hypocrisy to their government's perception in the Middle East. More importantly, Arabs understand more about global power structure by living their lives than American do by viewing their mainstream media. How much anti-U.S propaganda does it take to radicalize someone whose relative has been killed by an American soldier in Iraq, who has been tortured by an American backed dictatorship, whose neighbor's home has been destroyed by an American supplied missile? No amount of spin will change that.

Monday, December 14, 2009

Arrest Warrant Against Livni a Positive Step


The decision of a British court over the weekend to issue an arrest warrant against former Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni in connection with her involvement in war crimes and crimes against humanity as a member of the War Council during Israel's operations in Gaza earlier this year represents a positive step even though the warrant was later canceled. The London court ordered Livni's arrest after it mistakenly believed the Israeli war criminal entered British territory, but was forced to annul it after it was revealed she had scrapped a planned appearance in the country. That means Livni avoided fugitive status only because of a legal technicality and not political pressure on the judiciary.

This is the third time this year an Israeli official involved in massacres in the Gaza Strip has encountered legal difficulties while attempting to travel to the United Kingdom, but it represents the first arrest warrant issued against an Israeli minister. Earlier this year a court blocked an attempt to arrest Defense Minister Ehud Barak, claiming he enjoyed diplomatic immunity. Strategic Affairs Minister Moshe Ya'alon declined an invitation to speak in Britain in October after being warned he could face arrest in connection with a 2002 missile attack in Gaza which killed a quadriplegic Hamas official and fourteen civilians.

Even if judicial proceedings in countries with favorable relations to Israel do not lead to arrests or conviction they provide a valuable deterrent to future crimes. They also offer a de facto travel ban, which serves to isolate those who engage in crimes. Israel already regard Britain and South Africa as particularly problematic countries and has assembled teams of lawyers in the event that a senior official ends up in the docks answering war crimes charges. It has already reportedly advised some individuals against traveling to certain countries. Even if the Israeli government has no qualms in slaughtering civilians it is beginning to realize that there is a price for actions incompatible with civilized opinion.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

10 PEOPLE WORTHY OF A NOBEL PEACE PRIZE

There are billions of people who, by doing nothing, have done more to advance global peace than the American President, in Oslo accepting a peace prize today. Of the thousands of individuals who have devoted and risked their lives to struggling for a more peaceful world, ten who would have made exceptional Nobel laureates in place of the latest war criminal to receive the award.

Aminatu Haidar- Western Sahara
Since she was twenty-three years old Aminatu Haidar has been a leader in the non-violent struggle on behalf of the human and political rights of the people of her Moroccan occupied homeland. Despite multiple arrests, torture, a four year forced disappearance in her twenties, public beatings, and lengthy imprisonments Haidar has remained steadfast in her devote to peaceful methods of change, causing her to be dubbed the Gandhi of the Sahara. Nominated by the American Friends Service Committee in 2008 for the Nobel Peace Prize and a recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award, her work has earned international distinction. Last month as she attempted to return from the U.S where she was accepting the Civil Courage Award Moroccan authorities seized her travel documents and deported her against her will and without her passport to Spain, which has refused to allow her to leave the country without a passport. In response she announced her intent to fast to the death if the illegal actions of Rabat and Madrid are not reversed. Nearly four weeks into her hunger strike the situation remains unresolved. As Barack Obama accepts a Nobel Prize in Norway a genuine advocate of peace is nearing death at Lanzarote Airport in the Canary Islands.

Noam Chomsky- U.S
A summary of Noam Chomsky's work would be impossible. For decades he has been the global peace and justice movement's preeminent intellectual. The formidable intellect that revolutionized linguistics is equally formidable in defending human rights. In a world where propaganda is typically a more powerful weapon than blunt force there is no greater menace to the interests of power than the well reasoned and forceful attacks of Noam Chomsky on the abuses of the establishment. Though ignored entirely by the mainstream U.S media Chomsky's work has made him an icon of hope both in his home country and abroad. It is difficult to imagine a world without the forceful morality and powerful intellect of Professor Chomsky. He has done more to subvert oppressive power structures than perhaps anyone else in the second half of the twentieth century.

Ghassan Andoni/ISM- Palestine
Faced with daily occupation and oppression by a racist, colonial army, many Palestinians have embraced violent resistance. Ghassan Andoni sees that strategy as counterproductive. It gives the enemy a propaganda tool, provides a pretext for further aggression, and marginalizes the nascent Israeli peace movement. The two conditions that must be reached for the occupation to end, Andoni argues, is for its price to exceed its benefits and for an anti-colonial movement to emerge from within the colonial power. In 1987 Andoni put those principles into action with the foundation of the International Solidarity Movement, a nonviolent Palestinian resistance organization composed of Israeli, Palestinian, and international volunteers. That work has come at price, several of the ISM's 4,000 members have been killed or seriously injured by the Israeli military, but it has also worked to undermine the occupation, both on the ground, and in the eyes of the world.

Abdul Sattar Edhi- Pakistan
In 1951 Abdul Ehdi received basic medical training from a doctor and spent his savings on a tiny dispensary to provide free care and a building to house literacy classed. Devoting himself absolutely to the poor Dr. Edhi spent his nights sleeping on a concrete bench outside the dispensary to be able to assist all he needed help whenever they needed it. As Edhi's work gained recognition his tiny charitable operations began expanding, eventually becoming the Edhi Foundation but his spirit of compassion never changed. Over fifty years later he remains an indefatigable servant of humanity, on call 24/7, counseling victims of abuse, presiding over one of the world's largest charities, speaking out against injustice, and even begging for the poor on the streets.

Malalai Joya/RAWA- Afghanistan
A Woman Among Warlords is how Malalai Joya entitled her biography. For good reason. Afghanistan's youngest MP until she was suspended from parliament for condemning warlordism, Joya is perhaps Afghanistan's most popular politician. She and the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan have devoted themselves to fighting both the Taliban and the foreign occupation. Joya is confident she will not die in her bed. She travels around Kabul secretly, changing safehouses often under the protection of an armed guard. The warlords who she so passionately denounced threatened to rape her in the parliament building, she has received numerous death threats, but she has not been intimidated into abandoning her struggle for secular democracy and womens' rights. Few other people have so courageously and selflessly defended human rights.

Baltasar Garzón- Spain
No one has done more to intimidate and deter war criminal than Spanish judge Baltasar Garzón. Because Spanish law embraces universal jurisdiction, the idea that some crimes are so serious any nation may prosecute them, Garzón has had a free hand to investigate and indict the perpetrators of crimes against humanity. His work led to the indictment of former Chilean dictator Gen. Augosto Pinochet. American, Argentine, and Spanish tortures, murderers, and Genocidaires have all been targeted by this courageous judge. Though politically embarrassing to his government Garzón has made enormous contribution in deterring future atrocities.

Denis Mukwege- Congo
Denis Mukwege's father was a priest. As a boy he resolved to become a doctor so that he could heal the sick his father prayed for. Today he works eighteen hour shifts treating victims of gang rape in the world's most deadly conflict. Despite numerous threats on his life Dr. Mukwege continues to tirelessly and selflessly devote himself to treating the neglected victims of the Congo's civil war, providing treatment to the victims of war and hope to all of humanity.

Hu Jia- China
There are few Chinese issues Hu Jia has not been involved in. Environmental activism, AIDS awareness, human rights, and political liberalization have all been championed by Hu. Instead of recognition that work has earned him the attention of the security services. Today he is serving a three and a half year sentence for "inciting subversion of state power and the socialist system". His crime: interviews with foreign media and articles posted online critical of his government.

Ragıp Zarakolu- Turkey
Ragip Zarakolu's childhood interactions with members of Turkey's Greek and Armenian minorities left a deep impression on the young Turk. In his twenties he became a vocal human rights activist, and in 1971, a prisoner of conscience for his unauthorized dealings with Amnesty International. His journalism, exposing and condemning human rights abuses, brought him to prison three more times before the conclusion of the decade. After forty years, some in prison, Zarakolu's crusade continues. Despite endless legal proceedings and threats from right-wing organizations he continues to champion human and minority rights and reconciliation among Turkey's ethnic groups. His publishing house is a pillar of dissident circles.

Piedad Córdoba- Columbia
In war torn Columbia opposition Sen. Piedad Córdoba consistently offers a voice of peace, as well as an advocate of gender, racial, and sexual equality. As a advocate of an end to the long running conflict between the government and FARC rebels she has endured treason charges and a kidnapping, but has preserved in her pursuit of a peaceful end to the fighting that has devastated her home country.

Sunday, December 6, 2009

EQUATORIAL GUINEA AND THE AXIS OF OIL


Despite extensive PR spending and business deals with western nations one of Africa's worst dictators remains largely ignored, and for a good reason, his human rights record is so blatantly horrific the most gifted PR specialist could not defend it, affording human rights activists a unique opportunity to disrupt the tacit support of their government for a brutal thug.


Following the press release posted on Equatorial Guinea's website where Ambassador Purificación Angue Ondo proclaims "[h]is Excellency President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo has been re-elected. . .with 95.37 percent of the vote," is a notice that the statement was "distributed by Qorvis Communications, LLC and Cassidy & Associate." While President Obiang is not as popular in Washington as the official results of the former Spanish colony's November 29 poll suggest he is at home, so popular in fact that he won 103% of the votes at some precincts in the 2002 election, the west's supine reaction to the election contrasts sharply to the reaction to Zimbabwe's 2008 Presidential contest.

Obiang's journey to power began as the Spanish sought a leader they could control after they left their African possession. They settled on Obiang's uncle, a man handpicked for his stupidity. Obiang assumed a senior military position within the new government. As governor of the notorious Black Beach Prison he celebrated his new status with night long 'torture parties', today opponents accuse him of cannibalism. When one of his uncle's killing sprees targeted close relatives the ruling family moved against him. Obiang led the coup, executed his uncle, and assumed power. Obiang still rules thirty years later, guarded by foreign mercenaries, whom are thought to be more loyal than the military.

During the reign of Obiang's uncle the country was so poor dissidents had to be garroted to conserve bullets. A third of the population either fled or were killed. The paltry sums the government earned from declining agricultural revenues barely put it on the map. In 1994 the American ambassador John Bennett, an ardent critic of Obiang, departed after receiving death threats. The U.S embassy shut down two years later, weeks later a huge oil field was discovered. The man locally dubbed Africa's worst dictator, and there was much competition for that title, was out of the political wilderness. In 2003 the Bush administration reestablished an embassy in the capital of Malibo, on land rented from a senior regime official.

Equatorial Guinea was open for business. The form director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, General Henry Soyster, now in the private world, defended business dealing with Obiang's police state. "They do have a poor human rights record," said the General "but so did the Nazi government, and we did pretty well with Germany after World War II." Reporters without borders might rank Equatorial Guinea's press freedom bellow those thriving democracies of Sudan and Libya, but the nation's output of 450,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day mean Equatorial Guinea should now be viewed as, in the word's of its President, a "democracy in development." A view that could be certainly seconded by its PR firm in Washington.

The dictator's government, previously unconcerned by its international image, began spending millions of dollars each year on U.S PR firms. That was small change for a ruler whose multi-billion dollar oil fortune makes him one of the world's wealthiest men. In theory Equatorial Guinea's people should have an income on par with, or above, that of the U.S or western Europe. The small nation of 600,000 takes in billions of dollars each year in oil money. In practice only a select few benefit while most of the population does not have running water or access to basic health care. That small investment, coupled with the vast oil reserves, bought Obiang new prestige. The man described as a god and a cannibal in state media was described as a "friend" by the American Secretary of State.

"For a long time our relationship with Equatorial Guinea revolved around human rights," one oil company official said, ". . .now that the energy picture is changing, that introduces something to balance out the dialogue." Former American Ambassador Frank Ruddy put it more bluntly, the U.S "for reasons of realpolitik treated a dictator.. with the greatest respect." Under the current arrangement Obiang give the U.S oil companies free access, they give him a quarter of the proceeds, and the American political establishment ignores the African nation that makes Zimbabwe look like a functioning democracy.

Neither side is satisfied with the arrangement. It is one of pragmatism, not love. The American oil companies are fed up with the detrimental corruption. Obiang, while politely ignored by the U.S media, does not have a positive image. Unlike other dictators supported by the U.S there is no ideological commitment to his regime. Those feelings are certainly mutual. Obiang appreciated the patronage of the world's only superpower, but he would gladly find a new benefactor if it suited his interests. The Chinese are already developing their interests in the nation and would be glad to supplant the role of the U.S if afforded the opportunity. That makes the Obiang government particularly vulnerable to pressure from western activists.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

SWITZERLAND BANS MINARETS


Switzerland's vote to ban the construction of new minarets was billed by its far-right supporters as a largely symbolic referendum on extremist ideology. It was, just not the brand they envisioned. The move by Swiss voters exemplifies the disturbing trend of racial hatred and xenophobia that has been in the upsurge in Europe recently, particularly in the East, but increasingly in western Europe as well. The vote had nothing to do with the oppression of religious minorities in Islamic nations as was often suggested. It is curious that voters in a western country such as Switzerland seem to think Saudi Arabia's policies towards minorities merit imitation, as many of those who supported the ban claimed.

The only connection between the vote and extremism is that it was an extremist proposition. Muslims are increasingly playing the role that Jews took for much of Europe's history and that the Roma people continue to play as the scapegoat of choice. Whenever there is economic difficulty it is easiest to kick some minority in the face instead of addressing the problem. But, I will not devote any more time to condemning the resurgence of extremist ultra-nationalism in Europe. If anything good has come out of this vote it has been the near unanimous condemnation of it by outside observers, a respond that is more than sufficient.

Rather, it is important to ask why 57% of Swiss voters approved this measure, and what can be done to stem the tide of xenophobia and neo-fascism in the western world. The much proffered notion that this is due to Islamic extremism is patently absurd. If anything it will increase the alienation and thereby contribute to the radicalization of Muslims. This vote has little to do with Muslims, it has to due with insecurity in western nations, economic insecurity, but also insecurity in national identity, an insecurity that breeds fear, hatred, xenophobia and extremism. What is to be done?

To an extent education about different cultures is helpful, though this is a palliative and not a cure. Minorities do not owe majorities constant explanations of their actions nor should they be expected to takes some loyalty tests. A minority cannot afford to be quite as cocky as Jabotinsky suggested and the attitude of "instead of turning our backs to the accusers, as there is nothing to apologize for, and nobody to apologize to, we swear again and again that it is not our fault." But it must recognize the limits of education and dialouge, it must recognize that it has no need or obligation to explain itself to every petty bigot. The most effective way of undermining far-right extremism fall somewhere in the middle.

The most important thing is too isolate the extremists. Education is an important part of this, it is useful in pealing away innocent and ignorant supporters of intolerant views. When dealing with extremists it is important to remember that most are simply ignorant, not malicious. They sincerely believe the nonsense they are sprouting. For these people, many of whom have gone on to become prominent advocates of tolerance, it is important to offer education and patience. However, for the irreconcilable radicals and their opportunistic leaders there can be no hope of conversion. This core group must be isolated, stigmatized, and marginalized. This must be accomplished through a coalition of minorities and underrepresented groups as well as civil society organizations. Hatred cannot be eliminated, but its effect can be mitigated. Above all, it is important not to destroy these efforts by meeting intolerance with intolerance.